How Uncharted 4's Retro Surprise Was Rebuilt From Scratch

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If you've played Uncharted 4, you were probably thrown for a bit of a loop when Uncharted 4 not only references Crash Bandicoot, but lets you play an entire level of the game in-game (whoa, that's meta). You may have thought, however, that developer Naughty Dog simply emulated their older game inside their newer one. You'd be wrong.

While this has been known for a while, Youtuber Shesez has a full breakdown of how the level isn't running on an emulator, but rather was remade by Naughty Dog from scratch. The level not only includes a very accurate recreation of the "Boulders" level from the original Crash Bandicoot, but layers on a coat of aliasing as well, which makes the recreation look nearly identical to the original. The level is located within Uncharted 4's regular geometry, and can be seen in its entirety if you know where to look and have the camera hacks to do it. You can watch a short video explaining the level below.

And for a chat with Uncharted 4's developers about how that moment came to be, you can watch our interview with them about their favorite moments from the game below.

Suriel plays a lot of Dota and fighting games and likes to watch other people play them. He's more or less made a career out of doing both for the past few years. He likes other games, too, though. Promise.